This very topic was being discussed on Gary and Larry's show this morning and it sounded poignant enough to tackle here, so what say we all give our two cents? Naturally, I'll start off with a page and a half of my own opinion.

Obviously, there are varying layers to this question and, ultimately, it comes back to the "Good-vs-Bad Trade" thread - in terms of what we got back from Milwaukee. For the first half of the season, Bogut was Jesus. He wasn't suited up and standing tall inside, but he was here in spirit, the team reflected his nasty, gritty frame of mind on defense, and everybody was praying that he'd return to save us from low-seed mediocrity and propel us into the upper echelon of Western Conference teams (which, at least on paper, is where this team looked like it belonged at the start of the season).

There were no delusions about upstaging the OKC's and the San Antonio's, but teams like Denver and Memphis looked specifically ripe for the slaughter. I know I, for one, would have taken our roster over those teams at the beginning of the year and I was quoted, in the season preview thread, as claiming that the tie-breaker between those three teams (GSW, MEM, DEN) would ultimately be health... and it was. Denver - until recently - was healthy all year, Memphis lost Gay halfway through the year but ultimately didn't lose a beat while their roster remained largely intact. Golden State, however, was a far different story. After losing their 6th Man (and reigning 3-point percentage leader) in the 2nd game, the Warriors managed to trot out their prized center only 30 times this year; half of which, Bogut himself would tell you, the Big Aussie looked nothing close to himself. Imagine Memphis without Marc Gasol for half the year and only getting 6 minutes from Jerryd Bayless before losing him for the season. All things considered, the Warriors have recovered quite well. Denver's magically healthy season has them leading the Clippers for the 3 seed, but Memphis and Golden State are right where they should be: occupying the 5th and 6th spots for the playoffs. A healthier Dubs team looked capable of a 4-seed to me, but if if's were fifths, we'd all be drunk...

The x-factor at the center position, the thing keeping Golden State afloat instead of mercilessly undersized like last year, has been Festus Ezeli. No question. In 41 starts with Ezeli up top, the Warriors are 24-17 (58.5%). In 11 less games with Bogut, the team is 18-12 (60.0%), meaning Ezeli is keeping the Warriors at approximately the same level Bogut is. And, thus far, he's been everything that Andrew Bogut was supposed to be; a tough interior defender, a finisher who doesn't demand the ball on offense, a results guy (not a numbers guy), and - wait for it - the absolute perfect compliment to David Lee.

... by the way, anybody disputing Lee's value to this team compared to Curry and claiming that Steph & Klay should be the central cogs of the offense, outta take this stat into consideration:

The Warriors, when David Lee takes as many or more field goal attempts as Stephen Curry this year, are 18-3 (85.7%). If you have a rebuttal for that one, Blackfoot, I'd LOVE to hear it. Cause I've been calling David Lee the true center of this offense all year and it definitely shows in the win column. Efficient inside offense beats risky jump-shooting every time. Smart betting beats large betting.

But I digress...

After Festus Ezeli's 13 rebound, 3 block game against the Spurs, the big rookie looks primed to cover the Warriors in the (chillingly likely) event of Bogut's playoff absence... And if you didn't notice Bogut's cranky, displeased look when Ezeli sat down next to him on the bench after that double-swat block party, take this into account: Bogut, who was supposed to miss the remainder of the regular season and heal up for the playoffs, traveled with the team to Portland today and is a game-time decision. Sounds like somebody's a little unsure about his job security...

This very topic was being discussed on Gary and Larry's show this morning and it sounded poignant enough to tackle here, so what say we all give our two cents? Naturally, I'll start off with a page and a half of my own opinion.

Obviously, there are varying layers to this question and, ultimately, it comes back to the "Good-vs-Bad Trade" thread - in terms of what we got back from Milwaukee. For the first half of the season, Bogut was Jesus. He wasn't suited up and standing tall inside, but he was here in spirit, the team reflected his nasty, gritty frame of mind on defense, and everybody was praying that he'd return to save us from low-seed mediocrity and propel us into the upper echelon of Western Conference teams (which, at least on paper, is where this team looked like it belonged at the start of the season).

There were no delusions about upstaging the OKC's and the San Antonio's, but teams like Denver and Memphis looked specifically ripe for the slaughter. I know I, for one, would have taken our roster over those teams at the beginning of the year and I was quoted, in the season preview thread, as claiming that the tie-breaker between those three teams (GSW, MEM, DEN) would ultimately be health... and it was. Denver - until recently - was healthy all year, Memphis lost Gay halfway through the year but ultimately didn't lose a beat while their roster remained largely intact. Golden State, however, was a far different story. After losing their 6th Man (and reigning 3-point percentage leader) in the 2nd game, the Warriors managed to trot out their prized center only 30 times this year; half of which, Bogut himself would tell you, the Big Aussie looked nothing close to himself. Imagine Memphis without Marc Gasol for half the year and only getting 6 minutes from Jerryd Bayless before losing him for the season. All things considered, the Warriors have recovered quite well. Denver's magically healthy season has them leading the Clippers for the 3 seed, but Memphis and Golden State are right where they should be: occupying the 5th and 6th spots for the playoffs. A healthier Dubs team looked capable of a 4-seed to me, but if if's were fifths, we'd all be drunk...

The x-factor at the center position, the thing keeping Golden State afloat instead of mercilessly undersized like last year, has been Festus Ezeli. No question. In 41 starts with Ezeli up top, the Warriors are 24-17 (58.5%). In 11 less games with Bogut, the team is 18-12 (60.0%), meaning Ezeli is keeping the Warriors at approximately the same level Bogut is. And, thus far, he's been everything that Andrew Bogut was supposed to be; a tough interior defender, a finisher who doesn't demand the ball on offense, a results guy (not a numbers guy), and - wait for it - the absolute perfect compliment to David Lee.

... by the way, anybody disputing Lee's value to this team compared to Curry and claiming that Steph & Klay should be the central cogs of the offense, outta take this stat into consideration:

The Warriors, when David Lee takes as many or more field goal attempts as Stephen Curry this year, are 18-3 (85.7%). If you have a rebuttal for that one, Blackfoot, I'd LOVE to hear it. Cause I've been calling David Lee the true center of this offense all year and it definitely shows in the win column. Efficient inside offense beats risky jump-shooting every time. Smart betting beats large betting.

But I digress...

After Festus Ezeli's 13 rebound, 3 block game against the Spurs, the big rookie looks primed to cover the Warriors in the (chillingly likely) event of Bogut's playoff absence... And if you didn't notice Bogut's cranky, displeased look when Ezeli sat down next to him on the bench after that double-swat block party, take this into account: Bogut, who was supposed to miss the remainder of the regular season and heal up for the playoffs, traveled with the team to Portland today and is a game-time decision. Sounds like somebody's a little unsure about his job security...

So who ya got, GoldenStWarriors?

Durable, athletic, runs-the-floor-and-finishes, Festus Ezeli?

or

Intelligent, enormous, extra-playmaker-up-top, Andrew Bogut?

In response to your bold. Correlation =/= Causation. Don't feel like actually delving into it a lot though.

First, I don't understand why this topic exists, is this even a question? Second, apparently it is, either that or someone seizured and clicked the wrong option... I'm going with the latter because nobody can honestly say Ezeli is the better option.

32 wrote:Nah, dude, it's been proven time and time again.

Post scorers > jump shooters, in terms of efficiency.

It doesn't take Lee as many shots to get off as it does Curry. When DLee leads the offense, the Warriors play better. It's conclusive data.

Again, something I had no idea was even a debate. Of course post attempts are better than jump shots. Our record would look a lot better if we tried to feed our skilled bigs more often instead of settling for 3s all the time. Not to mention we wouldn't suffer the enormous FT deficits we do nearly every game. This isn't even opinion, it's fact and it always has been.

Teams take the second most threes vs us and hit at the fifth lowest rate in the league. Our problem is inside defense. We are going to get ripped to shreds by the Nuggets inside if Bogut is not ready to go and is playing in peak condition.

This series depends on Bogut's defense. Lee is an awful defender, it comes with the territory of his solid play in the rest of the game.

I want to address one thing as well. Festus started the season with one of the easier schedules and we had the toughest schedule in the league right around when Bogut came back.

Bogut is not worried about his job security. He is obviously better. It's not a question.

Curry's TS percentage is 580 and Lee's is 560. Curry's way more efficient and it's not close.

TS% favors outside shooters, so of course Curry has a higher one than Lee. Lee doesn't hit three's to jack up his rating. TS% isn't my preferred method for gauging efficiency because it rewards players who chuck 3's from the outside. Inside buckets > outside buckets, in terms of efficiency. It's not even close.

Teams take the second most threes vs us and hit at the fifth lowest rate in the league. Our problem is inside defense. We are going to get ripped to shreds by the Nuggets inside if Bogut is not ready to go and is playing in peak condition.

This series depends on Bogut's defense. Lee is an awful defender, it comes with the territory of his solid play in the rest of the game.

I want to address one thing as well. Festus started the season with one of the easier schedules and we had the toughest schedule in the league right around when Bogut came back.

Bogut is not worried about his job security. He is obviously better. It's not a question.

Well, firstly, we surrender a lot of inside points because our guards allow a lot of penetration. They run guys off the 3-point line, but they don't really defend them after that. We've had this conversation before and I listed 6 or 7 links to players who have flat out gotten off on Klay Thompson this year. Maybe not from deep, but definitely overall. Bogut can't defend 5 guys at once (although, if that breakaway 3 weeks ago is any indication, he can defend 4 guys at once ).

And secondly, I don't want to be the one getting caught defending Ezeli here, because I certainly want a healthy Bogut getting the lion's share inside... but the reason this is an issue is because of that word "health". Bogut hasn't been himself this year, as evident by all measures of evaluation - be it the eye test, traditional stats, advanced stats... Bogut has had a drastically regressive year in terms of production. I'm not denying that Bogut is an asset when he comes outta the gate hot after getting 3 or 4 games off to rest his ankle; but his value seems to ebb the longer he streaks games together. I'm not an alarmist chirping on a blog that its something ridiculous like osteoarthritis, but I am willing to admit that Bogut came back far too early from microfracture surgery... and that's not even counting his 4 games in October/November; I'm literally just talking about January, which was a month and a half earlier than his surgery's birthday. Most microfractures take a year to heal; Bogut tried it after 7 months and was back at it on month 10. So I believe he's got some residual soreness that will lighten up after the off-season. But in the meantime, his wheel gets progressively weaker the more games he puts on it. For this reason, it might be wise to insert Ezeli for a longer period of time (more than 20 minutes a night) even when Bogut is healthy.

And then, of course, there's the issue of pace. A lot of Warriors fans believe that the Dubs are at their best running the floor. So structuring a lineup that fuels that style is rather key. Obviously, this includes Curry, Thompson, Barnes, and Jack... But as far as bigs go, after David Lee, the next best guy to take off down the floor and fill the lanes has been Ezeli. Landry is a half-court scorer who prefers to hunt down low and Andrew Bogut is a trailer on the fast break (and that's putting it lightly). Not only that, but transition defense demands Ezeli as well. When was the last time anyone saw Andrew Bogut streak back on defense after a guard gave up a steal at the top of the arc? Either way you slice it, Ezeli is more of a runner than Bogut and it pays off - in a run & gun style game - to give him extra tick. Of course, there are additional factors that come into play: Bogut's outlet passing, for example, work better in a fast-paced game than Ezeli trying to send out a long delivery. But strictly in the mobility department, Ezeli gives you twice the movement with only a fractional loss of power.

Again, I don't want to get stuck defending Ezeli (it'd be nice if whoever voted for him would speak up to fortify their position), but there's definitely a reason this is an issue.

They think it's gonna be a short series, Bogut or not. Denver set a new record for points in the paint this year - 58 per game, compared to the Shaq-Lakers old record of 54 per game. Denver not only punches it inside, but they're one of the premiere offensive rebounding teams in the league, so they usually get more than one look at it.

Blackfoot wrote:Yeah, this is the worst possible match up for us. I agree.

Yup. I'd really would've preferred San Antonio, but that boat has sailed. For us to win, everything has to click. One mistake and we're going down.

Who knows though. Maybe Roaracle goes ape **** and helps us get 2 or 3 games.

That seems to be the consensus on Denver's board; they know Oracle is a tough place to play and they're anticipating dropping a game (possibly two) in Oakland, but the confidence of that fan base is off the charts.